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Old 05-01-2006, 03:41 PM
pzhon pzhon is offline
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Default Playing Small Stacks in Tournaments

I like this approach. It applies to other situations, such as analysis of the stop&go technique associated with Greg Raymer, calling from the blinds with about 1 PSB left with the intention of pushing any flop.

I think the main conclusion of this article is incorrect: "if your opponent is acting optimally, it is never better to make a small raise preflop, planning to push any flop and to call any preflop reraise, than it is just to push all of your chips into the center before the flop." For example, I think it is likely for it to be right to do this with AA (and other hands) in some circumstances, even without assuming suboptimal play by your opponent. Here are some problems I have with the analysis:

[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] You are free to make a small raise with other hands without the intention of calling a reraise, or of calling a stop&go on any flop, or of pushing any flop if your opponent checks to you. That I might make a small raise with AA, then call all-in or push any flop, provides cover for the times I might make a small raise with a weaker hand. My opponent does not know that I plan to push the flop with this hand when I make a small raise.

Compare the situation with a multi-round bluffing game. We know I either have the nuts or a bluff. If I push on the first round, I can bluff less frequently than I have the nuts. If I make smaller bets on 2 rounds, then with deep stacks I can bluff almost 3 times as frequently as I have the nuts. When I have the nuts, I will bet and bet again. Some of the time, I bluff once and give up. It is not wrong to bet less than all-in with the plan of betting again on the next round.

In that example, there wasn't a flop that gives your opponent more information, and it was right by a lot to bet on both rounds. The betting amounts may change, but the fact that I should use my option to bet on both rounds is not changed by a modification of the bluffing game that gives you a small amount of information after the first betting round. Maybe you believe there is enough information on the flop in Hold'em to give up the option to bet on multiple rounds, but that would take a separate argument, and I don't agree.

[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] You don't know that the pot will be heads-up against that particular opponent, and neither does a caller who is not last to act. You might get called in multiple places. You might get a call, and then someone might raise, or there may be a reraise and a call. This might add more dead money, or it might give you the information you need to fold. Even if you end up heads up, a small raise might be called by a different player.

[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] "Since she is increasing her EV, your EV must decrease... While the situation above is not a two-person game, she increases her EV by gaining chips from you so this must cost you EV." No, both players may gain if they are risk averse. I believe that was the theoretical justification given by Raymer for the stop&go: It may give up some expected chips against a good player, but it decreases your chip variance. Much of the time, the decrease in variance is not worth much, but it is important in SNGs. See the past discussion of the stop&go in the STT forum.


I like the attempt, but I think the analysis was faulty and I disagree with the conclusion.
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  #2  
Old 05-01-2006, 04:53 PM
JaredL JaredL is offline
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Default Re: Playing Small Stacks in Tournaments

Thank you for the feedback. I didn't have much time to write my article due to some personal matters, I should certainly have been much more clear on some things which you bring up.

[ QUOTE ]
I like this approach. It applies to other situations, such as analysis of the stop&go technique associated with Greg Raymer, calling from the blinds with about 1 PSB left with the intention of pushing any flop.

[/ QUOTE ]

I actually like it too. This article is simply the start of some more in-depth analysis on this situation. I plan similar analysis of the stop and go.

[ QUOTE ]

[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] You are free to make a small raise with other hands without the intention of calling a reraise, or of calling a stop&go on any flop, or of pushing any flop if your opponent checks to you. That I might make a small raise with AA, then call all-in or push any flop, provides cover for the times I might make a small raise with a weaker hand. My opponent does not know that I plan to push the flop with this hand when I make a small raise.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is prefectly correct. In this article I'm saying that pushing is better than making a small raise and pushing any flop, calling should you be reraised. It's simply comparing two strategies, not guiding your overall play. I will be studying other strategies, which involve sometimes folding ot a reraise and sometimes checking the flop, in future writings.

[ QUOTE ]

[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] You don't know that the pot will be heads-up against that particular opponent, and neither does a caller who is not last to act. You might get called in multiple places. You might get a call, and then someone might raise, or there may be a reraise and a call. This might add more dead money, or it might give you the information you need to fold. Even if you end up heads up, a small raise might be called by a different player.

[/ QUOTE ]

This point is valid, though I suspect it isn't relevant. I should have been more careful in specificying that I was assuming a heads up pot. I'll have to think about this a bit more perhaps but I think that the same reasoning would apply if the pot went multiway. Say you are on the button with a raising hand. Say you make a small raise and the sb and bb both call. Let's say the SB would have folded had you pushed. That means that the SB has gained EV from your small raise, otherwise she still would fold. The question becomes whether the she would gain this much, or more, EV from the big blind. I don't see that being the case if both players act approximately optimally. Also, if both players are gaining EV this means it must come from you.

[ QUOTE ]

[img]/images/graemlins/diamond.gif[/img] "Since she is increasing her EV, your EV must decrease... While the situation above is not a two-person game, she increases her EV by gaining chips from you so this must cost you EV." No, both players may gain if they are risk averse. I believe that was the theoretical justification given by Raymer for the stop&go: It may give up some expected chips against a good player, but it decreases your chip variance. Much of the time, the decrease in variance is not worth much, but it is important in SNGs. See the past discussion of the stop&go in the STT forum.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is a valid concern to bring up. How will the variance change? I don't think by much. Let's take a look.

She can change her play in two spots - preflop and flop. Preflop she will only call when she would have folded otherwise. This will lead to more variance from these hands as they will all go from fold - you get the blinds to her calling preflop where you will sometimes get the blinds plus the preflop raise, sometimes double up plus a bit, and sometimes bust out.

On the flop she can fold a hand that she would have gone to showdown with. This will decrease variance.

So basically, I'm not even sure that variance will go down with the described strategy. It could certainly go up. Either way I doubt it will change much.

As I said, thanks for the feedback. I think this is to date my worst article. However, I think your concerns are not with the analysis but the writing. You make valid points about its shortcomings (ie I'm just comparing two strategies, not two styles of play).

Jared
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  #3  
Old 05-06-2006, 10:57 PM
4222 4222 is offline
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Default Re: Playing Small Stacks in Tournaments

I'm also sceptical. It depends on how short your short stack is. For instance, a hand I have had trouble with in SnG's & MTT when short stacked is pocket Jacks. On several occasions when I've had about 5 orbits left (M=5) I've pushed all-in with my Jacks, only to be called by bigger paint (usually AK/AQ). This only gives me about a 57% advantage, with my whole stack and any chance of a come back on the line. I therefore think, in this particular case, it is better to raise preflop, and judge the flop after for the allin, as your then about 75% against AK/AQ, as well as having an escape route if the flop goes against you.
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  #4  
Old 05-09-2006, 01:22 AM
MyTurn2Raise MyTurn2Raise is offline
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Default Re: Playing Small Stacks in Tournaments

HOw do you know if the flop goes against you?

Are you folding when any A hits?

I love it when I get all-in with an M of about 5 and am better than 54% to win
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  #5  
Old 05-09-2006, 03:04 AM
JaredL JaredL is offline
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Default Re: Playing Small Stacks in Tournaments

[ QUOTE ]
I'm also sceptical. It depends on how short your short stack is. For instance, a hand I have had trouble with in SnG's & MTT when short stacked is pocket Jacks. On several occasions when I've had about 5 orbits left (M=5) I've pushed all-in with my Jacks, only to be called by bigger paint (usually AK/AQ). This only gives me about a 57% advantage, with my whole stack and any chance of a come back on the line. I therefore think, in this particular case, it is better to raise preflop, and judge the flop after for the allin, as your then about 75% against AK/AQ, as well as having an escape route if the flop goes against you.

[/ QUOTE ]

Firstly, I'm not convinced that you should do anything but push in your example. In the post above this one, you can see the argument that you will be in a tough spot if precisely one overcard came and are fairly likely to make a mistake there.

Again, I want to clarify a couple things. I was planning to describe shortcomings of my point next article, and should have taken into account that they come a month apart and should be separate bodies of work.

Here is what my article does NOT say:
- raising all in is the best strategy against all opponents
- raising all in is the best strategy against opponents who act close to optimally
- making a small raise before the flop is worse than pushing

What my article says:
Making a smaller raise with some of your raising hands and then pushing any flop, calling any reraise is a worse strategy than pushing before the flop with those hands if your opponent is acting approximately optimally and has a good read on you.

There are several things that you could do that could be potentially better than raising all-in. For example, you could make a small raise and then use the flop to decide what to do with some or all of your raising hands. Also, if you assume that your opponent either doesn't play optimally or has a bad read on your play then some small raise strategy could be better.

Again, I will be discussing this a bit more in next months article.

Jared
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